Checks and Balances
by C.Queen
Summary: When Florian starts acting secretive Noir gets worried. Just what is the blonde up to and why wont Florian tell him?


Disclaimer: As always I own nothing but the original characters and the situations I put them all in. Everything else belongs to somebody else and that's way it has gotta be, people. Thanks so much for reading, I hope you'll review and tell me what you think!

Checks and Balances

Sitting, brooding in his office, Noir couldn't begin to imagine why the Irish apparently enjoyed the past time so much. Brooding did nothing but piss him off and give him an even bigger headache than he'd had before he'd started the damn brooding in the first place. And that was saying something. Absently tapping his fingers on the arm rests of his chair, Noir debated for the thousandth time simply confronting Florian about the past couple of weeks. And just like all the other times, Noir knew he'd do no such things even as he strategized as to ways to do it. In the end though, he was simply too cowardly to do it. Besides, the damn pain in his ass was good at keeping secrets, especially when he was pushed to do otherwise. The whole thing could be innocent as hell and Florian would make him think it wasn't, just to punish him for sticking his nose in where it didn't belong. It did too belong, Noir thought darkly, his eyes turning to eye the bottle of brandy resting on his desk. As tempting as it was to drown his misery in the lovely amber liquid, he knew he'd catch hell for it later. Florian hated it when he drank too much. And how the mighty had fallen that he cared.

This was what he got for stealing from people for a living. His damn heart had been stolen and he hadn't even been aware he'd had the damn thing until it was missing, snatched from his soul before he was even aware of the transference. And you'd think Florian would feel some responsibility, taking a guy's heart and all without even a bye your leave. But no, Florian felt free to abuse his heart whenever it suited him, the bastard. Of course there was the fact that he abused Florian's heart even more, but Noir wasn't the type to dwell on his own sins very long, especially when he could abuse others for theirs.

The whole mess had begun innocently enough, Noir mussed, turning it around in his mind. At first Florian had just been staring off into space more than usual, seeming lost in thought at the stupidest times so that he'd had to be extra vigilant to make sure the idiot didn't get his fool neck broken. Then the letter had came, the one Florian had lied to him about getting. When Laila had mentioned in passing that Florian had gotten a letter, he had thought nothing of casually asking Florian about it. And what had Florian done? Gone pink in the cheeks and LIED right to his face about even getting a letter. Playing dumb when anyone with even the smallest lick of sense would know he was lying. From then on it had been little things, their numbers the only thing that had tipped him off that something was going on, something big that Florian didn't want anyone to know about. He had told none of their men or Laila anything, he'd quiz them all at length and threatened them with such things that they wouldn't have dared lie to him. He'd also made them swear not to tell Florian he'd asked, which was also why he couldn't ask the brat Noel if he knew anything about it. The kid told Florian everything. It wasn't his birthday or anyone's for that matter, and Christmas was a long way off yet as well. So what the hell was going on here?

What scared him the most of course was one of the possibilities that had popped into his mind not so long ago. The idea that Florian might be making preparations with the intent to leave him. After all, it would be no easy feat, getting away from him and Florian knew it. Plus, Florian would never leave without Noel, which would make things that much more difficult. Why else did he let the brat stay with them. But really, would Florian be thinking such things? Could he have come up with some way to get enough coinage to pull off something like that? There was that diamond of course, but Florian had seemed to believe his story that it was essentially worthless. But after that one day he'd never seen the diamond again. Where had it gone?

Whatever else he might have thought was interrupted then, by the sound of a brisk, yet somehow hesitant knock on the thick oak door. Given the latness of the hour it wasn't hard for Noir to guess who it could be, intruding on his brooding. "Enter."

)

The door opened and in stepped the man of current mystery, casually dressed for an evening at home in a long sleeved blue shirt and black trousers, the blue a stunning contrast to Florian's already stunningly beautiful amethyst eyes. Watching the blonde carefully close the door behind him Noir considered getter up, than decided to remain where he was and let Florian come to him. Please God let him come to him and stay there.

"Am I interupting anything?"

"What is it you want?" Okay, so he was being a tad rude, so sue him. If he was about to be dumped he had every right to be in a foul mood. It was going to take months of brainwashing Florian into staying with him again, which was what he'd have to do if the idiot thought for one second he was going anywhere without him.

Well used to Noir acting like as ass without just cause Florian simply walked over and drawing something out of his pocket set it down in the middle of Noir's desk. It was a single, rectangular shaped piece of paper. A check.

Picking it up as though he weren't inwardly shaking Noir looked down at the paper and felt a shiver of fear roll down his spine. It was a check, a check made out to him from Florian for a vast sum of money. An amount that would almost, far too nearly, pay off the man's considerable debt to him. "Is this some kind of joke?" Noir demanded to know, glancing up to meet Florian's eyes with fiery intensity. Florian didn't have this sort of money, he didn't have any money.

"It's how much I owe you. With that my debt is clear." Lifting a hand Florian effectively cut off whatever Noir might have said. "I checked my debt total this morning. This check is exactly what I owe, minus the money you included there for the money you paid my mother for me. She died before she could cash it and I'd imagine the check burned up with her in the fire. You never thought I'd realize that, did you?"

He'd really hoped the idiot would never clue into that. "But the rest of the money, where the hell are you going to get this much money? I pay for everything you own, eat, and sleep under." Which was just how he preferred it.

"I sold the diamond. I sold it the first chance I got, to Mr. Traveres."

Shit, shit, shit. Traveres was a man he often dealt with, a man as obsessed with gems as he was. Traveres was also an underworld figure with a vast fortune and someone who could in fact afford to pay Florian an exorbitant amount of money for that damn diamond. Of course the diamond in question was actually priceless, but he could still see Traveres giving Florian the amount of money on the check and more to get his hands on that huge, flawless, perfect example of natural beauty. But hold on... "We haven't been to see him in two years!"

"And your point?"

He'd had the abilities to escape him for two years and hadn't done so? He was only now deciding that he wanted to use all that money to gain his freedom? A crushing weight landing squarely in his gut Noir felt like he'd just been worked over by a legion of Black Hand members. "Why? Why now?"

"Well it's because-"

"How dare you think you can leave me." Standing up so quickly he tipped his chair over Noir didn't even hear it crash onto the hardwood floor, the buzzing in his ears so intense it didn't even register. "I saved you from a life of poverty and humiliation and this is how you thank me? I bought you, God damn it and you can't leave me. You won't leave me. I wont let you leave me."

"What?"

"You heard me. You. Belong. To. Me. No exceptions. No negotiations. So just suck it up because that's the way things are."

At first Florian just stared at him in confusion, than understanding slowly dawned, causing the blonde to have to bite his lower lip to keep a little smile from escaping. "Noir...if you'd just take the check and promise to cash it I'll get on to the second half of my reason for being here."

"I don't want to hear it." If he didn't hear it, it wasn't real.

"You're being childish."

Since he was being childish, Noir covered his ears with his hands for good measure.

)

Amused Florian rounded the desk and surprised the heck out of Noir by getting down on one knee in front of him. It so surprised him that he took his hands off his ears, letting them fall dumbly to his sides. When Florian reached out and took his left hand in his, Noir made no attempt to stop him or pull away.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"I was trying to explain that when you covered your ears like Noel does when he knows I've come to tell him its past his bedtime."

Not liking the comparison at all Noir was so peeved at the thought that he forgot he didn't want to hear what Florian was trying to tell him. "So what are you doing?"

Taking a deep breath first, Florian answered him.

"With that check..with the payment made, I'm a free man. I stand before you as a man with means who no longer needs to depend on you for food, clothes or shelter over my head. I owe you nothing and you don't owe me anything either. I didn't give you the money before because I didn't...I wanted to have that to fall back on, for Noel and I when you got tired of having us around. I knew, know that you only allow him here, with us, because of me, because you see him as one more chain to bind me to your side. And you..you chose me out of all the willing men who would follow you anywhere because of my eye color and the fact that I don't take your crap the way everyone else does. I always thought, somewhere in my mind, that someday you'd have enough and those two things wouldn't be worth keeping me around anymore. But that's not how I want it to be. How it can't be anymore. So I'm here, as your equal, as the man...who loves you more than anything or anyone in this world...asking if you would be mine, as I am yours." Shoving his free hand into his pocket Florian withdrew a small, velvety jewelry box. "If I could, this would be where I asked you to marry me, but no one would marry us and even if they would it wouldn't be legal or binding. But I can give you a symbol, wear a symbol that has just as much meaning as a wedding, maybe even more so. Will you wear it?" Reluctantly letting go of Noir's hand Florian, with slightly shaking fingers, opened the velvet box to reveal two identical rings in its soft, silky interior. They were braided yellow and white gold, with a repeating pattern of brilliant amethysts and shimmering green emeralds. The rings seemed to shine with a life of their own, the nearby lamp giving them an inviting glow. Pulling the larger of the two rings from its place Florian set the box still containing his down and holding the ring in one hand reached out for Noir's left once again with the other.

His hand visibly shaking, Noir slid his darker, calloused hand into Florian's, watching with eyes blazing with emotion as Florian slipped the ring onto his left ring finger. It fit as though it were made for him.

Overcome Noir dropped down to his own knees, his eyes never leaving Florian's, the amethyst depths burning with the love, need and devotion that burned in his own eyes. Never looking away for a second Noir reached over and retrieved the second ring, copying Florian's early motion by holding his own ringed hand out to take Florian's left hand in his. As he slid the ring into place, he spoke in a tone barely above a whisper, for Florian's ears only.

"I, Ray Balzac Courland, take you, Florian Rochefort, to be my unlawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold, in sickness and in health, for better or for worse as it so often is, for longer than we both shall live."

"As do I."

"Damn right you do."


End file.
